Regulation New Rules

20th November 2012

New EU rules will bring safer, cleaner motorbikes without driving up costs

Motorbikes, trikes, quads and lightweight vehicles will be safer and cleaner, and manufacturers will have greater certainty over how they should develop their vehicles after the European Parliament today adopted new performance and design standards.

Malcolm Harbour MEP, Chairman of the parliament’s internal market committee that worked on the proposals, welcomed agreement on the new rules that bring 15 existing EU directives into one new regulation.

To resolve concerns around the anti-tampering measures that the European Commission had initially proposed, the agreement now only requires manufacturers to build in anti-tampering measures on bikes where power or speed is restricted, for young or inexperienced riders.

Opening up technical information will help independent repairers to maintain bikes, trikes and quads, and enthusiasts to customise them.

The motorcycle industry has been keenly awaiting the new legislation so it can start making investments in the next generation of cleaner and safer machines.

Mr Harbour has been working closely with a number of motorcyclist organisations, attempting to shape the law to better suit the wishes of enthusiasts.

Accompanying the regulation on motorbikes is a separate proposal setting standards for tractors.

Under the new regulation tractor categories will be split into two groups according to speed, with higher speed tractors requiring ABS. The distinction would enable companies such as JCB to invest in new tractor technologies

Speaking after today’s vote, Mr Harbour said:

“This vote is the culmination of a great deal of listening to biking enthusiasts so that we could put in place a law that makes two, three and four wheeled machines safer and cleaner, without ruining their cherished hobby.

“This new type approval framework will secure the future of motor biking for a generation.

“There has been significant scaremongering about the purpose behind this law. It was simply to make 15 outdated laws setting technical standards into one current law, which will be easier for manufacturers to decipher. We always had at heart the best interests of millions of people across Europe for whom biking is a way of life.”

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One particular group of motorcyclists in Europe had been very aggressive with regards to the Approval and Market Surveillance of 2 or 3 wheeled vehicles and quadricycles.

Trying to understand the logic behind their demands was incredibly difficult, because the demands from them relating to the Type Approval proposal changed from day to day and for every logical explanation given to their demands, a raft of accusations and rhetoric came as a response.

For those that disagreed with their argument (by “they” we mean the proponents of the campaign), the response was character assassination. “You’re either with us or agin us”.

Character assassination is highly effective and there is a fantastic explanation in the article “How Cults Work” on the following website: http://www.howcultswork.com/

“Character Assassination is used to help create the guilt in you. Character Assassination is a type of false reasoning used by people and groups who have no real arguments. The technical name for Character Assassination is “The Ad hominem Fallacy”.

This is how it works. Imagine if you will a conversation between two men, Ford and Arthur…

“One plus one equals three”, says Ford.

“No I don’t think so. You see when I have one thing, and I have another thing, then I have two things not three”, replies Arthur.

“I see your point, but what you must realize is that one plus one when calculated in relation to this complex number domain, which I just invented, and then squared by the sum of the ninth tangent in the sequence of the Fibonacci series results in three!”, stated Ford triumphantly.

Ok, Ford is wrong, but that is not the point. The point is that Ford tried to answer Arthur’s reasoning with more reasoning of his own. This is the healthy way people and groups debate subjects. Now lets see what would have happened if Ford had used Character Assassination…

“Arthur I have been a mathematician longer than you. How dare you disagree with me! You are obviously a very smug and prideful person. I think you are disagreeing with me because you are jealous of me, and to be honest with you Arthur your rebellion has really hurt me and a lot of other people too”, stated Ford his face intimidatingly close to Arthur’s.

You see Ford didn’t answer Arthur’s argument, instead he attacked his character.

If you are not aware of how Character Assassination works then it is a powerful way to exert control over you”.

Equally disconcerting but extremely relevant in the context of this discussion is “Information Control” also mentioned on the website http://www.howcultswork.com

“Those who control the information control the person. In a mind control cult any information from outside the cult is considered evil, especially if it is opposing the cult. Members are told not to read it or believe it. Only information supplied by the cult is true. One cult labels any information against it as “persecution” or “spiritual pornography”, another cult calls it “apostate literature” and will expel you from the group if you are caught with it. Cults train their members to instantly destroy any critical information given to them, and to not even entertain the thought that the information could be true.

Common sense tells us that a person who does not consider all information may make an unbalanced decision. Filtering the information available or trying to discredit it not on the basis of how true it is, but rather on the basis of how it supports the party line, is a common control method used throughout history”.

Investigative Research NI

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